Page:The Biographical Dictionary of America, vol. 07.djvu/27

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

LONG


LONGFELLOW


1777. As commander of a regiment of invalids and convalescents in the retreat, July 5, 1777, he engaged the 9th regiment of British regulars, Colonel Hill, and had nearly vanquished them when his ammunition became exhausted and he was obliged to retreat to Fort Edward. He served there and at Lake George and Lake Cham- plain and was present when Burgoyne surren- dered at Saratoga. For his services he was brevetted brigadier-general. He was a delegate from New Hampshire to the Continenal congress, 1784-86 ; a member of the executive council, 1786-89 ; and a delegate to the state constitu- tional convention of 1788. President Washington appointed him U.S. collector at the port of Ports- mouth in 1789. His daughter Polly married Col. Tobias Lear, secretary to President Washington, April 17, 1790. Before taking charge of the office as collector General Long died at Ports- mouth, N.H., April 3, 1789.

LONG, Stephen Harriman, engineer, was born in Hopkinton, N.H., Dec. 30, 1784; son of Moses and Lucy (Harriman) Long. He was graduated from Dartmouth college, A.B., 1809, A.M., 1812, and taught school, 1809-14. He entered the U.S. army as 2d lieutenant of engineers, Dec. 12, 1814, and was professor of mathematics at the U.S. Mili- tary academy, 1815-18. He was brevetted major of topographical engineers, April 29, 1816, and had charge of governmental explorations of the terri- tory between the Mississippi river and the Rocky Mountains, 1818-23, and discovered the peak in Colorado which bears his name. He was married March 3, 1819, to Martha Hodgkins of Philadel- pliia, Pa. He explored the sources of the Missis- sippi river, 1823-24 ; was brevetted lieutenant- colonel, April 29, 1826, and was engaged in surveying the line of the Baltimore and Ohio railroad, 1827-30. He was engineer-in-chief of the Atlantic and Great Western railroad in Georgia, 1837-40, where he introduced a system of curves in the location of the road and a new truss bridge called by his name. At about this time he was connected with the proposed national road from Portland, Maine, to Canada. He was promoted major in the topographical engineer corps, July 7, 1838, on the organization of that corps. In 1860-61 he was on duty at the mouth of the Mississippi river, and was called to Wasliington and advanced to the rank of colonel, Sept. 9, 1861 ; served in the war department there, and on June 1, 1863, was retired on surgeon's certificate, but continued to perform important official duties until his death. For his work as an explorer he received recognition in American literature in Edwin James's " Account of the First Expedition to the Rocky Mountains, 1819-20, from notes by Major Long and others " (1823) ; and William H. Keating's two volume


work, " Long's Expedition to the Source of St. Peter's River, Lake of the Woods" (1824). He was a member of the American Philosophical society and the author of: Railroad Manual (1829), the first work of this title published in the United States. He died in Alton, 111., Sept. 4, 1864.

LONGFELLOW, Ernest Wadsworth, painter^ was born in Cambridge, Mass., Nov. 23, 1845; second son of Henry Wadsworth and Frances (Appleton) Longfellow. His preparatory educa- tion was acquired in private schools in Cam- bridge and Boston, and he was graduated from Lawrence Scientific school, Harvard, S.B., 1865. He studied art in Paris under Hebert, and after visiting Italy and Germany he returned to Amer- ica in 1866. He was married in 1868 to Harriet E., daughter of Israel MonsonSpelman, and again went abroad, studying under Bonnat in Paris, 1868-69. On his return in 1869 he opened a studio in Boston. He exhibited " The Old Mill " at the Centennial exhibition, Philadelphia, 1876 ; studied under Couture near Paris, 1876-77, re- turning to America in 1879. He was vice-presi- dent of the Boston Art club, 1880-82, and was later- elected a member of the Century As- sociation. His earlier works include : Italian Phiferari (1877) ; Choice of Youth (1878); Evening on the Nile (1880) ; Morning on the ^gean (1881), and three portraits of Henry W. Long- fellow : 1, at Craigie House (1876) ; 2, at Bowdoin college (1881) ; 3, finished after the poet's death. His later works consist chiefly of small land- scapes and ideal nude subjects.

LONGFELLOW, Henry Wadsworth, poet, was born in Portland, Maine, Feb. 27, 1807 ; son of the Hon. Stephen and Zilpah (Wadsworth) Longfellow. He was named for his maternal uncle, a lieutenant in the American navy, who when nineteen years of age perished gallantly at Tripoli in the fire-ship Intrepid. He spent his boyhood on Congress street, Portland, his mother's ancestral home, and began his school life at the age of three, attending a school kept by Mrs. Fellows. He entered a public school in Love Lane, Port- land, in 1812, where he remained for a week, when he was removed by his parents to a private school kept by Mr. Wright and later by Mr. N. H. Carter. After attending Portland academy, 1813-21, he entered Bowdoin college and during his course there contributed occasional poems to periodicals, his first printed verses, "Tlie Battle of Lovell's Pond," appearing in the Portland Ga- zette of Nov. 17, 1820. At the senior examina- tion he made a translation from Horace which was warmly approved by one of the college trustees, Mr. Benjamin Orr, who recommended young Longfellow for a proposed chair of modern languages. The trustees provisionally approved the proposal, stipulating that Longfellow fit